Cuban Ambassador Oscar Leon, speaking on Tuesday before the UNESCO Executive Board, stressed that the Caribbean island will not renounce the socialist project chosen sovereignly by its people, despite increasing hostility on the part of the United States.
 
'Nothing and no one will stop the Cuban people's will to build the socialist society that they have decided to construct exercising their self-determination,' the diplomat noted, speaking on the second and last day of the general debate of the 207th session of one of the constitutional bodies of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
 
According to Leon, Cuba will remain on that path and continue to work with those who advocate relations between Havana and Washington based on respect, sovereign equality, collaboration and mutual benefit.
 
However, he noted that the bilateral situation is increasingly tense, due to the aggressiveness of the current US administration.
 
'Since we met in April, the US blockade against Cuba has been tightened,' Leon explained, who described US policy on Cuba as genocidal.
 
Leon warned that no sector of Cuban society escapes that hostility, including the fields of concern to UNESCO.
 
'Other peoples of the world are also affected due to its extraterritorial scope. The annual report from the United Nations Secretary-General on the blockade of Cuba contains vast information about the damages,' he noted.
 
In his speech, the Cuban ambassador recalled that the international community will shortly have the opportunity to once again demand an end to the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed on Cuba for more than 60 years, at a new vote in the UN General Assembly.
 
Since 1992, the UN General Assembly, made up of 193 member States, has overwhelmingly supported a resolution submitted by Cuba on the need to lift the unilateral blockade.
 
This year's vote will take place on November 7, a day after Cuba introduces the initiative at the General Assembly, to condemn a measure that has cost the Caribbean island 922.63 billion dollars in accumulated damages.